New Sefer About Rav Shach: “Prohibited to Antagonize Secular Jews”

A new sefer about Rav Elazar Menachem Man Shach named Besa’aros Eish has been written by one of his confidants, Rav Rafael Wolf. At one point, the sefer discusses his attitude to the insults to which leaders are sometimes subjected. Rav Wolf recalled that Rav Shach requested that all pashkevilim written against him should be buried with him in his kever.

“All the insults a person gets in this world will help him a huge amount to lighten his judgment in the next world, and how much more regarding insults one receives al kiddush Hashem!” Rav Shach explained. “The honor a person receives in this world reduces his reward in the next. The degradation a person gets here adds to it.”

A talmid chochom’s wife once complained to Rav Shach that her husband was suffering from public insults. In response, Rav Shach took out from his safe an envelope containing a rope that someone once sent him as a subtle threat. Rav Shach kept the rope to be placed with him in his grave.

Rav Shach opposed the over-preponderance of demonstrations and warned that they could be dangerous.

“Just as it is forbidden to antagonize non-Jews, so it is prohibited to antagonize secular Jews,” he maintained. “If an irresponsible person throws a stone at a policeman and arguments erupt it can be dangerous.”

Rav Shach related that in Vilna, Jewish shops opened on Shabbos on the very street where Rav Chaim Ozer Grodzinsky lived.

“Rav Chaim Ozer did not protest [openly] about it. I don’t know why, but so it was!” Rav Shach recalled. “To protest, he would personally enter the Jewish shops open in Vilna after kabbolas Shabbos and say to the owners, ‘A gut Shabbos.’”

It’s impossible to supervise the behavior of all the participants in a protest, Rav Shach explained. If someone is arrested and jailed, the physical and spiritual stain left on the person can persist for his whole life and the person who caused it will be called to justice.

“Demonstrations are certainly not the correct way and not a solution,” he said. “Demonstrations only make problems for bochurei yeshiva in regard to the draft.”